


Life Will Still Go On, Believe Me

by Lollopy



Category: EastEnders (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-17
Updated: 2019-07-17
Packaged: 2020-06-29 21:34:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19838932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lollopy/pseuds/Lollopy
Summary: It’s been over a year since Whitney was last in Walford - over a year since another relationship ended in a mess. She’s taken a well-deserved break from dating, and shuts down any suggested blind dates from mates immediately. Sometimes she feels like printing out little business cards detailing her past love life, and handing them out to anyone who’s ‘got this friend she’d get on really well with’...





	Life Will Still Go On, Believe Me

It’s been over a year since Whitney was last in Walford - over a year since _another_ relationship ended in a mess. She’s taken a well-deserved break from dating, and shuts down any suggested blind dates from mates immediately. Sometimes she feels like printing out little business cards detailing her past love life, and handing them out to anyone who’s ‘got this friend she’d get on really well with’...

In all honesty, it wouldn’t be that difficult to go on avoiding Walford for the rest of her life, even if she stays in London. But it’s where Tiffany is, as well as half her friends, and she’s done well to go a year without being called back for some kind of party or emergency or both. Suggesting she meet the younger girl here for a trip into town, instead of trying to hunt each other down in the middle of Oxford Street, seemed like a good baby step in getting over her (understandable) aversion to the place.

She steps out of the station with a smile on her face. Albert Square isn’t the biggest place in the world, so she's told Tiffany she'd come and find her. At the time it had made sense; it’d give her a chance to hunt down some people and say hello on her own terms. It’s two o’clock on a Wednesday, so the chances of bumping into anyone she doesn’t want to see should be minimal. But now she’s back here, she’s thinking she’s made a mistake. She knows what they’re going to be thinking of when they see her. It's why she left quietly one early morning all those months ago, when everyone was opening their post and reading over the cancellation cards she'd sent out First Class. _Irreconcilable differences,_ they'd said. _Apologies for the short notice_. She hadn't wanted their pity, or the nosiness disguised as sympathy when they found out what really happened.

The anxiousness makes her pause. Instead of heading off to the left with purpose, she dawdles. Checks her phone, although she’s not expecting anything. She could do with a cup of tea but that would mean the café, and…

She turns to look the other way, on the off-chance a Starbucks or a Costa or some other chain have managed to invade the outskirts of the Square, and regrets it immediately.

Ben and Callum are walking towards her. _Ben_ and _Callum._ Callum is dressed in the same black suit she last saw him in, tapping away on his phone and Ben is finishing off what looks like a slice of Tottenham cake. It’s definitely them, but they haven't spotted her.

She ducks back inside the station entrance, half-hidden by a wall. This - this she wasn’t ready for. Separate, sure, she could have dealt with bumping in to one of them. But not both of them, not _together_.

It’s quiet enough and they’re close enough that she can hear their conversation as they make their way down the pavement. She hopes the small changes to her appearance – the shorter blonde hair, the light tan – are enough to keep them from recognising her if her cover isn't as good as she thinks.

“It’s only ten minutes on the bus,” Callum is saying, and Ben snorts around the food in his mouth.

“Since when did you do home visits?” He shrugs one shoulder.

“She’s 95, you can’t drag her across London-“

“Err, what happened to ’ten minutes on the bus’?” Ben interrupts as he pulls a face. Callum carries on.

“-when I can just go to her.”

“Such a _gentleman_ ,” Ben says in a teasing voice, bumping their shoulders together.

“Shut up.”

They reach the bridge and come to a stop. Whitney has to take half a step out of her hiding place to keep them in view. Callum looks down and checks his phone one more time.

“Two minutes for the bus.” The phone goes in his jacket and he jams his hands into his trouser pockets.

“I’ll see you later then.” Ben reaches over and puts one hand on Callum’s shoulder, his thumb against his neck before they lean towards each other.

It’s not a kiss that would make it into a romcom. Ben’s still chewing that cake, for God’s sake. No fireworks, no dramatic music, no whistles from passers-by. It’s ordinary, domestic, and almost mechanical, and that is somehow so much worse to see.

Callum wrinkles his nose as Ben moves away.

“Ergh. Nice.” The other man grins and opens his mouth wide as he walks backwards, displaying a mess of beige sponge and pink icing.

“You’ve got crumbs on your face,” he calls out as he turns and leave.

Callum smiles to himself as he watches him go, and as he brushes the crumb of pink icing from the edge of his mouth, and as he walks towards the bus stop.

Whitney is _not_ still waiting for Callum to come to his senses, like she was for weeks after his quiet, simple confession had tipped her world on its head. He could spend every day for the next six months begging for forgiveness, say it was the biggest mistake of his life and he'd do anything for her for the rest of hers, and she still wouldn’t consider taking him back. He could literally be the last man on Earth. But it still hurts her to see him looking a hundred times more relaxed than he ever seemed to with her. That look of uneasiness and anxiousness that she assumed was just 'Callum' is nowhere to be seen. Ben Mitchell, she thinks with a twist in her gut, does not have to stand half-naked in front of the TV to try to get his attention. It's that thought that spurs her into motion.

She all but runs back into the station and through the gates. ‘Meet me at the station,’ she types out in a text to Tiffany, and starts to climb the stairs two at a time to wait on the platform. Maybe one day, in the future, she'll be able to see this and just feel happy for them, and a visit to Albert Square won't be a mission that needs to be planned out in advance. But she's not quite there yet.


End file.
